Ken’s Comments (group member since Jan 21, 2020)

Ken’s comments from the The Obscure Reading Group group.

Jan, Yvonne, Jean --

I don't think anyone needs to apologize for missing out on reading a book or finishing a book or whatever. This is not a required course, just elective. And you can audit it if you want. Or skip class if you want.

And Yvonne, that holds true even if you nominated the book (frankly, I forgot that it was you). Life interrupts. That's what it does now and again. I wouldn't take it personally if some readers didn't love it, either. After all, it's the book they're struggling with, not the book's picker.

That's why we encourage selecting a book you yourself have not read -- so nothing is taken personally, as might happen if I nominated one of my most cherished books only to have half the readers not much care for it.

And fear not, Jan! I once thought my retirement slash library cruising days would never arrive, yet here they are! Tempus keeps fugit-ing after all. The older I get, the faster it seems to go! (Cruel, cruel world.)

The Fourth of July is nigh,
the Winter's Night thread
is archived.


That's your poem for the day. Here in Maine, where drought has been the rule, we have a cool rain falling.

Finally!

The irony is that Memorial Day weekend was wall-to-wall rain with temps in the 50s and now we're getting a forecast of mostly rain for the weekend of the Fourth with temps around 60. This after 5 days in a row over 90 last week AND an all-time record for heat in Portland for the month of June (climate change? WHAT climate change?).

Me, I'm not complaining. Every day's a holiday when you're retired.
And if rain/cool weather keeps crowds down, it's good. And if there are fewer fireworks, better yet. Along with most dogs and the loons and the lakes (that take all the junk from people firing off huge displays over the waters), I am not a fan.

More irony: America gives huge cash infusions to its arch-economic foe, Red (and getting Redder by the day) China by buying all these fireworks to celebrate democracy (which, by the way, is slowly being dismantled by states led by legislators in the He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named cult).

Two great page-turners I've read in recent weeks: The Plot and Homeland Elegies. If you want a good page-turner holiday, check 'em out!

AND finally, thanks to all participants in the Italo Calvino discussion. We've officially come of age here at the ORG, reading books we've all mostly agreed on and all mostly DISagreed on.

What more could one ask of great book discussions? (BTW, if you have an answer to that supposedly rhetorical question, let 'er rip. We take constructive criticism in these parts. Take it and run with it....)

It reminds me (for no good reason) of that dark and stormy night when Coleridge and Shelley and Lord Byron and Mary Shelley had that competition to see what writer could out-wow the other writer.

I get the impression that Calvino was showing off, first for some fellow writer(s) and then for lookers-on. As we used to say in our early bike-riding days: "Look, Ma! No hands!"

Any final thoughts before this heads to the archives (and don't you just love the smell of the stacks in old libraries?).

Well, we've done it. Waded through another of our 3x's a year discussions. I will leave the If on a Winter's Night a Traveler threads open for late comers who may still be reading. Then, after a week or two, I'll archive them.

Meantime, it's back to our own books and our in-between discussion area (here!). Our next meet-up will be October (a.k.a. "Published Before 1900" Classic Month). Seems far away, but time is a tricky thing. Kind of like Italo Calvino.

When I lived at home long, long ago, I was considered antisocial for leaving the communal television staring room for my bedroom where I could read in peace.

Which begged the question: How is watching a television with others in silence -- a passive activity -- "social"?

Ginny wrote: "I have been an avid reader as long as I can remember, and every once in a while I wonder what does that mean? What does it say about me? These days many "readers" participating in the discussions a..."


Loved that illustration, Ginny. And love the thought of you and your spouse taking turns reading the book to each other. I've never done such a thing with my wife, though good friends of ours shared how, in the early months of the pandemic, they took turns reading Lorna Doone to each other. I was mightily impressed and surprised at their choice.

It's interesting when we try to define "reading," too. I think many share your traditional view -- that it's reading the written word, vs. listening to the spoken word.

As a retired English teacher (both middle and high school level), I can tell you that many of my reluctant readers *loved* being read to in class. I tried to get them to follow along in the book because I knew it had added educational benefit to both SEE and HEAR words, but they never did. Any time I looked up while reading, their eyes were affixed on me, enjoying the spoken word in every way while avoiding the task of following sentences on paper.

So, is there a difference? Yes. And does it get to the heart of what reading is or isn't? The jury's still out.

So glad you enjoyed the book!

Thrilled to see, Lois and Cindy, that you enjoyed it so much! It's definitely a "parts vs. whole" for many readers. Some seem to have enjoyed certain parts but not the whole, while others were swept away by both.

As a reader, I find I read certain books without even noticing the demarcations between "parts" and "whole." In ones like this, the fault lines seem well defined. But, as Calvino well knew, the differences between us are vast and as varied as we are.

Where he excelled, I think, is in his understanding of readers being both unique and similar in many ways, like people. And he tried to address that, which isn't easy, with varying degrees of success.

My favorite name in the book (forgive if I misspell it now)? Prof. Uzzi-Tuzzi.

Mason wrote: "I absolutely LOVED it and have since added a bunch of Calvino to my TBR pile! Thank you, ORG for turning me on to him!

This quote cuts to the heart of my own reading mindset:

"I must not be distr..."


"I read, therefore it writes" indeed. And Calvino works both ways. There's a scene where the writer is watching a woman who is reading his book apparently as it is being written, as the author wants to see the effect (instantly!) if he were to write such and such.

Kafkaesque at times, I can see. It also brought Pirandello to mind. The guy whose characters were looking for their author. Here the writer is looking for his readers.

Nota Bene: I'm so glad that you -- and others here -- were really turned on to Calvino, Mason! It'll be a while before I come back to him, but I will, especially since those in the know say his other books are quite different.

Matthew wrote: "Carol wrote: "I am not finished yet. I read everyone’s comments. Interesting the various opinions people have. It appears to me Calvino mish mashed a few mystery styles into this book. I thought it..."


It's too bad he's not around for all of THIS feedback. I will say this: More than most authors, he seemed to give a damn about his readers, at least if we enter this book in the record as evidence.

Some writers (who say they "write for themselves") don't even give readers a second thought. Not even when cashing royalty checks -- a gift from readers to writers (and their middlemen, the publishers). ;-)

If you are FINISHED with "If on a Winter's Night a Traveler" (or if you don't care about spoilers), this is the discussion thread to discuss the second half of the book, which goes from the beginning of a chapter called "In a network of lines that enlace" through THE END.



Long ago there was a Broadway play called "What's It All About, Alfie?" Maybe a good name for this discussion would be "What's It All About, Italo?" Meaning: This is a great place to offer your theory on the novel's PURPOSE (along with any evidence you can summon).

Part One's discussion was fun because this is the Obscure Reading Group's most divisive choice yet, and I always like it when I read strong opinions from opposite positions. That said, some readers (like me) are in the middle here. But why? What worked and what didn't, if that's the case?

Please feel free to not only offer your answers/opinions but to ask your own questions. I'm sure there are enough to go around, right?

I had new books from the library calling my name. They were as bad as ice cream in the freezer, Cheez-Its in the cupboard, chocolate chip cookies in the cookie jar, which also call my name.

So I forced myself to the couch with Calvino to read the second half of the book. I did not let myself get up except for a homemade smoothie (the ingredients were calling my name... and how do all these things know my name?).

In a few hours I had done it. Finished June's Obscurity. Reviewed it obscurely. Rewarded myself with a new book, which I have already finished, which means I get yet another new book, which I have started.

Like a seal performing for fish (calling my name). That's me.

It's always nice to have a mutual friend. And I love books about reading books. What's his name writes them. Michael Dirda, that's it! (Washington Post)

Leanne wrote: "Hello everyone! Like Yvonne, I have been catching up with all your comments and now I think that I have gauged enough of the novel’s sentiments to make a somewhat substantial comment. I will admit ..."

Yes, Leanne, it is similar to dipping in and out of a movie or book. You walk into a room and see 10 mins of a movie on the TV, then have to leave. You re-enter hours later and see 10 mins. of a completely different movie.

Now take the same effect with a book like this. Brief chapters to entice and tantalize, but like Tantalus, we are denied when we bend our head to sip water or extend it to eat grapes.

You feel manipulated. You never get into what John Gardner called "the vivid and continuous dream" that makes good literature what it is. It's the "continuous" part that's missing -- the part that makes you forget you're in a movie theater at a good movie or have no idea of your surroundings when reading a good book.

Matthew wrote: "Ginny wrote: "Matthew wrote: " I certainly wouldn't be reading today if novels were only being written as they were in 19thC. ..."

Most of my reading time these days is with novels written in the ..."

Tolstoy and Twain -- different as they are -- happen to be my beau ideals as writers I could read forever, though in both cases there are certain books I'd pass on. That said, the ones I could read over and over are W&P (esp. Pierre and Natasha), AK (esp. Levin), and HF (esp. Huck).

Yvonne wrote: "OMG I just spent a long time catching up on all these comments above and composing a contribution, but then when I hit "post" I got a bunch of gobbledygook computer code on a pink screen and a Good..."

I do the same thing -- type my responses AND reviews in GR boxes when I should type them either in Word or in Google docs. It's asking for trouble typing them here, and you know how polite GR can be when you ask nicely.

I liked Cloud Atlas MUCH more than this book, or at least than this book at the halfway mark, as the CA stories were much more sustained than these are.

Sandra says: So, I would like to know if any of you have discovered deeper meanings to discuss other than the unusual style and its purpose.

Have at it, everyone! I don't do well with deeper meanings.

One note I made from that beguiling first chapter is how well Calvino knew both readers and writers (who are readers -- though readers are only occasionally writers).

He struck a chord with me when he mentioned how readers often take the "I" narrator to be the author, often assume authors are writing "what they know," often feel sure that authors are mining experience, memoir-like, even in the fiction form of a novel.

In poetry writing, it is even worse. Poets often use "I" as a "speaker" who is made up, but poetry readers doggedly read it as the poet himself, doggedly assume it to be "confessional poetry" (as it's called).

First-person POV does that.

It's a good time to have a last name beginning with "C." ;-)

Jan, I like your unexpected parallel to Cervantes. Don Quixote is a bit of a picaresque, and one trait of picaresques is that they jump from place to place, leaving behind characters met at an old location, constantly introducing new characters, settings, and situations. As readers, we "follow the adventures of..." a character (usually roguish) and enjoy the unfolding, meandering, traveling plot.

What if the roguish character here was the author pulling strings behind the curtain? "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!" the Wizard once said -- only ensuring that we'd pay that much MORE attention.